Ethereum Classic (ETC): ETCDEV has done well for ETC, but could EDCON change everything

Over the last few weeks, Ethereum Classic (ETC) has been doing pretty great and the crypto industry had taken note. Some people were even predicting that Ethereum Classic would at one point square it out with Ethereum, possibly surpassing it.

ETC is trading at $22.90 against the US dollar, up around 10% over the last 7 days and 6.2% in the last 24 hours. Over the last 30 days, the coin has gained about 75% against the USD, rising in value from $13 on April 6th to the current price of $23.69.

The ETCDEV team has done great so far

The ETC development team has worked hard and recently released their Emerald Wallet, herald as a new start. It assured the Ethereum Classic community of transacting in a secure and offline environment. This was a sign that ETC would be on its way back to the top. And true to that, the market has been bullish as ever, ETC/USD trading above $20 then moving on to try and break above $25.

Highlighting how they intended to further exploit the usefulness of the wallet, the ETCDEV team posited the following:

“In the future, the ETCDEV team is going to start splitting Emerald into several independent pieces, separating Emerald SDK and building a second Dapp, which is going to be an app for Smart Contract developers (develop/deploy/debug cycle). In addition to that, ETCDEV is going to work on a separate command-line utility to help 3rd party software to be integrated into Ethereum Classic.”

They also have been working on improving the coin’s network via use of sidechains. We all know the value of using the sidechain technology. They are meant to offer a balance between the advantages offered by a private network with the obvious security that comes with being part of the mainnet.

That’s part of the reason why Ethereum Classic (ETC), for the first time in many months, looked ready to reclaim its place as a dApps and smart contracts platform. It was ready to start attracting more developers due to being cheaper and affording users the freedom to choose and use from a variety of protocols other than POW, like proof of authority (POA) and proof of stake (PoS)

The more exciting news came on May 4, 2018, when Grayscale Investments announced that the public Quotation for Eligible Shares of the Ethereum Classic Investment Trust had been approved.

The trust enables ETC investors to gain free exposure regarding the movements in the market in terms of its price without having to face the tiring the challenges that come with buying, storing, and safely storing the coins.

EDCON could change

The ETC and ETH communities have never hidden the disdain they have towards each other. One claims to be the original chain, better for staying true to the principles of decentralization and immutability. The other boasts of a superiority borne of a better platform and the top minds in cryptocurrency. But all that hate did not rear its ugly face at the Edcon when a member of the ETC team spoke at an event organized by the Buterin side.

Anthony Lusardi, speaking at EDCON, suggested that Ethereum classic and Ethereum needed to explore ways of working together. Vitalik Buterin repeated the same call on his Twitter page.

It has prompted reactions such as:

However, some in the ETH camp are already seeing a merger between the two coins. There’s talk of merging the two coins, obvious feeling being that ETC should be swallowed up. The sentiment isn’t of course what the present scenario is, yet it feels a bit like ETC could be on the losing end in case of such steps being contemplated.

There has always been that nagging feeling that a time would come when the two Ethereum’s would need to do something about their split after the DAO attack. No one has said anything much yet, but it looks like the ETCDEV could be open to something close to a merger.

Of course, we can’t read too much into this, but just in case such a possibility arises, it’d be interesting. Truth is, I believe Ethereum Classic (ETC) has a very bright future as a dApps and smart contract platform.